SOC 1 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Qualitative Sociology, Steam Engine, Cogito Ergo Sum

• School: Irvine Valley College
• Department: Sociology
• Course: SOC 1
• Professor: brown

Document Summary

Anti-positivism: contrast to positivism, theoretical approach that considers knowledge and understanding to be the result of human subjectivity. While hard science may be useful for exploring the physical world, the social world cannot be understood solely through numbers and formulas. Anti-positivists assert that the formulas that positivists use to explain the universe have meaning only when we collectively assign social value to them that is, numbers have only relative importance. Example: you would probably feel gratified by an 89 percent on your midterm sociology exam. Your score has not changed, but your feelings about it probably would. All sciences will not merge over time and no single methodological approach (i. e. , science) can reach a complete understanding of our world. Science has been able to teach us a great deal about our physical world, but anti- positivists suggest that to truly understand the human condition we need to appreciate and validate emotions, values, and human subjectivity.